Saturday, October 31, 2015

“The Weekender” is our occasional feature where every weekend we hope to
highlight a short film, movie or documentary pertaining to the
Americas.

To commemorate Halloween, we're running the following post originally published on October 31, 2014. The text mostly remains the same but the video below the page break is changed.

What happens when the Cuban musician nephew of Dracula finds a secret
potion that allows vampires to be able to live under the sun's rays?
The answer to this can be seen in the 1985 animated movie¡Vampiros en La Habana! (Vampires in Havana).
The film provides a satirical look at both capitalism and Communism
when competing factions of vampires - a Chicago mob and a European
cartel - seek to get their claws on the "Vampisol" concoction from
Joseph Amadeus von Dracula. Featuring trumpet playing by the legendary
Arturo Sandoval, ¡Vampiros is not your usual scary Halloween flick but is instead a funny spoof of horror and gangster films.

An excerpt from ¡Vampiros can be seen below. (Note that the movie has some adult themes; hence, we're classifying it as Not Safe For Work).Online Source - imdb.com

Thursday, October 29, 2015

* Ecuador: In the latest twist to the legal telenovela that is the Ecaudoran environmental damages ordeal against Chevron, the oil giant’s main witness at a 2014 appeal recanted his entire testimony.

* Mexico: Mexican federal police committed extrajudicial killings in two incidents earlier this year that left some fifty people dead according to Human Rights Watch.

* Brazil: Community groups in Rio de Janeiro claimed that the government’s relocation program ahead of the 2016 Olympics is in reality segregating thousands of impoverished families.

* U.S.: The Kansas City Royals won the first two games of the World Series with help from Dominican starter Johnny Cueto who pitched a complete game gem on Wednesday night.

YouTube Source – teleSUR English (“The Canadian Supreme Court (last month) voted to a allow the lawsuit that seeks to recover US$9.5 billion from a 2011 compensation settlement arising from the pollution of land belonging to Amazonian indigenous villages by Chevron.”)

Monday, October 26, 2015

* Latin America: Elections were held in four countries of the Americas yesterday including Guatemala where Jimmy Morales became president-elect while a runoff will be needed to see who will replace Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner.